New hospital unit could cut ER wait time

POWAY -- Emergency wait-times may get a little shorter at
Palomar Medical Center come January, when the hospital is scheduled
to add a small unit that will help move patients out of the
emergency room more quickly and into the hospital's critical care
wing.

The seven-bed, $2 million unit will free up emergency room space
at the Escondido hospital and likely shorten waiting times for
patients, who currently spend between two and five hours in the
emergency room, officials said.

"Seven beds doesn't seem like a lot, but having that unit could
mean the difference between waiting all day and waiting for a short
time," said Palomar Pomerado Health system chief financial officer
Bob Hemker, who reported the hospital's plans for the unit to the
heath care district's board Monday evening.

Long emergency room stays can sometimes be blamed on a lack of
available beds for patients that need to be admitted to the
hospital, Hemker said. When more beds open up, the emergency room
can admit patients more quickly and free up emergency room space
for people in the waiting room, he said.

The new unit is scheduled to be completed by Jan. 9, according
to Hemker's report to the board of directors.

Also at the monthly meeting, board members swore in new director
Bruce Krider, who was appointed earlier this month to replace
George Gigliotti. Gigliotti quit in late September after 10 years
on the board.

Gigliotti resigned from the elected board one year into a
four-year term. Krider, a health-care consultant and a member of
the hospital district's fund-raising foundation, will serve on the
board until next November, when voters will decide who will carry
out the final two years of Gigliotti's term.

Krider said, after he was sworn, in that he was "pleased to be
on the board," and "happy to help make the health care delivery
system … a little better."

The Palomar and Pomerado hospital staffs also debriefed the
board on the hospitals' operations during the week of the deadly
Cedar and Paradise fires.

Almost all hospital staffers, including dozens whose homes were
threatened, worked through several nights to continue operating the
hospitals and their elder-care facilities during the week of the
blazes. On the first Sunday of the fires, Pomerado Hospital was
threatened by the Cedar fire in Poway and prepared to evacuate its
patients to other local hospitals, including Tri-City Medical
Center, officials said. Ultimately, Pomerado did not evacuate.

The hospitals treated 160 patients with fire-related injuries
during the five days after the fires began. Most were respiratory
and eye problems related to the smoke, but a few patients were
burned, emergency officials said.

Eight hospital employees lost their homes in the fires. One
worker, Lori Roach, lost her 16-year-old daughter, Ashleigh, in the
Paradise Fire on Sunday morning. Ashleigh died trying to flee the
flames in a car.

Ashleigh's sister, 20-year-old Allyson Roach, was severely
burned and is being treated at UCSD Medical Center's burn unit in
San Diego. She is awake after weeks of drug-induced sleep,
according to family reports, but is still fighting off fevers and
infection and is in danger of losing parts of her hands to
amputation.

Hospital workers have also created a fund using their vacation
days and personal money to raise more than $12,000 for the Palomar
Pomerado families who lost their homes.